Dear Wraye! RP is not Ricky Ponting, but Received Pronunciation! Wot used to be known as “pure” spoken English! as spoken byQueen and BBC newsreaders once upon a time! No doubt Queen still does.

Such glory days are obviously long gone, especially if you lot don’t even know what RP is!!

Dear English lady! RP is not Ricky Ponting, but Received Pronunciation! Wot used to be known as “pure” English! and BBC newsreaders only ever spoke RP!

Such glory days are obviously long gone, especially if you lot don’t even know what RP is!!

Heaven knows, while us Englanders continue to enunciate with (near) perfect diction, much the of the world is shoehorning the language into various new configurations. Perhaps in a few hundred years’ time, it will be taught in its pure form in schools, like Latin is today.

Cor blimey, ma, say it aint so… *sob* [stiff upper lip trembles]

For certain in the 8 years I’ve been playing competitive cricket, ‘yes, mate’ has been occasionally uttered – in particular when you are batting with a good mate (heh). You’ll find whenever an Australian player does it, he will be with a noted friend within the team; Ponting with Hayden, Hayden with Gilchrist, Symonds with everybody.

Friendship and unity within a team is better than chaos and fractures right?

we played against a guy we called deon – his call was ‘deon one’ (or two etc).

the call i would like outlawed is ‘can you?’ – should be answered with ‘none of your fucking business, MATE’.
nearly as bad is ‘not now’ – so you’re going to wait a couple of minutes ’til the ball is actually in the keeper’s gloves before attempting a run? also sounds like you’re treating the guy at the other end like a naughty schoolboy.

Did you watch how best mate Matthew Hayden somewhat shepherded Andrew Symonds to his first test Century in Melbourne? That’s what “mates” are for. That’s what “mates” are.

Full name Andrew Symonds
Born June 9, 1975, Birmingham, Warwickshire, England

England fluffed that opportunity didn’t they?

And regarding “terminological inexactitude” Scott, it pisses me off when people can’t talk with the slightest sense of grammar and spelling. No matter where they come from.

U no wot I meen?

To me, the usage of “mate” by the Aussies is just one of many positive team-mate supporting thing they do in batting partnerships. They are always talking mid-pitch between balls etc. Many other teams (particularly England) don’t communicate verbally much at all. I really think this communication between the Aussies is a contributor to why they are so strong a team. The usage of “mate” automatically makes you feel like you’ve got a mate there batting with you, rather than just a colleague propping up the other end. It’s a psychological positive. England should try it.

Yeah, so you probably are grasping for something to have a go at, but it’s your blog: you go for it, mate!

For what it’s worth, Kathy was also only having a laugh, in case you can’t understand humour, and was infact the first to point out the apparent lack of a rational argument here.

Surely Scott has something more interesting for you guys to read and comment on, on his new blog? Something with a more ’strine’ slant? Then we can get on with venting our unjustified frustrations without condemnation.

Hey Will, is the preview button busted, or is it just my ‘puter?

On the claim itself, I think you’re just tracking Roy’s influence on the game. He’s the only regular user of ‘mate’ in run calls. There’s nothing at all mannered about it; he’s just a better example of the broad Australian accent and lexicon than anyone else in the current Oz batting lineup. A well-known Australian social imperative then requires those batting with him – Clarke, for instance – to use the term more often themselves. That’s my theory, anyway.

So Will, mate, she’ll be apples, it’s “too easy”…mate… (or would you prefer Pommie B@stard?)

and there goes another red bus …

Kathy, don’t be so self-righteous! I think Fiona’s taking the piss, you know. Anyway, you could hardly call the English on this blog gracious – Will’s been having silly anti – Aussie rants for weeks now – so why is everyone else supposed to be?

One of the points about the Australian team is that we don’t restrict our team to the upper-middle classes. Maybe if England made cricket a friendly sport to working class people they’d be good at it too. Over recent years, we’ve had the likes of Ponting, McGrath, Symonds, Michael Clarke and Jason Gillespie play matchwinning roles for Australia. If they’d been born English, I doubt they’d have been made welcome in the English set-up.

Needless to say, with this proletarian outlook, the average Australian cricketer’s grammatical expressions do sometimes have terminological inexactitude.

By the way, just heard Mike Atherton. on the replay of the match on Foxpsports, greet Vaughan after winning the toss, with ” Well, mate….”

I don’t think you’ll find any of the Australian commentators know how to pronounce the name of their own country either.

Hell, I haven’t heard a Pom speak proper English for years! Not since they got rid of RP from the BBC.

Not being a bad loser, again, are we, Will?

You’re unhappy and you’re scratching for insults!